


Out Came the Flowers

by L_Sincline



Category: Voltron - Fandom
Genre: Angst, Character Death, F/M, Hanahaki Disease, Not A Happy Ending, hanahaki
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-27
Updated: 2018-02-27
Packaged: 2019-03-24 13:50:39
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,142
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13812504
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/L_Sincline/pseuds/L_Sincline
Summary: Lotor thought he could dodge the Hanahaki disease due to his Galra blood.He was wrong.Voltron Lotura Hanahaki disease AU where the Hanahaki disease is common among Alteans.





	Out Came the Flowers

It started small. 

Just as it always does for those unfortunate to have it start at all. 

It was an itch in the back of his throat. A mere disturbance to the task at hand, tracking the paladins. 

As his generals continued working on the hologram in front of them, he turned and coughed into his elbow. 

A single, small pink petal. 

He watched it float to the floor. 

They hadn't been on a planet with flowers that looked like that recently, he couldn't have just breathed it in. 

But he ignored it. 

What a mistake he made that day. 

How does one forget love? The answer is simple. 

You don't. 

No matter how hard he tried, no matter what he distracted himself with, Lotor would always have the feeling in the back of his mind. Always partially distracted by the mere existence of someone he shouldn't even have feelings for at all. 

Allura. 

The daughter of who used to be his father's best friend, Alfor. She was a mere bit I left than him, sure. But they had played on Daibazzal before it had been destroyed.   
"Can we be friends like our dads?" She had asked sweetly as they rushed through the halls of the Emperor's castle in a childish game of tag.   
"Forever and ever!" The foolish boy had yelled back before dodging around a corner. She had caught up, her legs being longer at the time, and tackled him to the ground, resulting in a laughing fit as she hovered over him with that wide grin and large blue eyes.   
"We'll be the coolest rulers ever! And we can take over Voltron for our dads when they're done!" She had exclaimed in excitement as the boy propped himself up on his elbows.   
"We'll be legends!" He promised, smiling back up at the Altean above him.   
"But I get the black lion." She suddenly demanded smugly.   
"What? No way! What makes you so special?" He had shot back in disbelief.   
"Well I'm older and taller, so it only makes sense." She replied, crossing her arms with a grin.   
"You won't be taller for long!" He grinned wryly as he pushed the younger girl off, running away again. 

That was before his father had demanded the rift be cut open farther, supposedly to shut it. 

But really, when you make something bigger, there's no stopping it, is there?

The only reason Lotor had lived for this long had been Haggar, someone he recognized has Honerva, his mother. 

She had experimented on him with the quintessence. Injecting it into his blood stream. And when she was done? She merely tossed him out like a worn out toy, exiled him. 

But now he was back, taking over for his father while he was sick, a perfect time to carry out his own plans under the radar of his father's empire. But something had struck a chord with him the other night, someone he recognized popped back into his life. 

Allura. 

The Paladins weren't the same, they didn't fight as a unit, they were a mess. He had targeted the blue lion, they had seemed the most inexperienced. But the minute he had gotten close, they had fought back, freezing the wing of his three sixty fighter. A name and a face clicked in his mind in that very moment, one that hadn't been in his mind for thousands of years. 

The pilot of the blue lion was Allura. 

The flowers were hardly there at first, only the occasional petal or leaf. But soon, bigger petals came, and soon after that, full flowers. Having to excuse himself from the hull of his ship to go and back up these wretched flowers. Watching the flowers leave smears of blood that originated from the back of his throat on his lips. It wasn't long before his smartest General, Axca, caught on. Lotor had been walking the halls of his large ship, making his way back to the main control room after spending a particularly long time in his chambers, whose floor was beginning to fill with flowers, hacking up more of the dreaded flowers that were filling his lungs.   
"Sir." He jumped as he heard the voice of Axca penetrate his wandering thoughts.   
"Yes, Axca?" Lotor replied, stopping to turn towards his general, hands tucked behind his back. Though he loathed the hoarse, scratchy sound his voice now had.   
"You're unwell. What disease bothers you?" She had asked, eyes narrowed as if she already knew the answer, but wanted to hear it from him first.   
"It's nothi-" Horrifically, he was cut off by another retching cough, causing him to hack up more petals, and towards the end, a single, large pink flower. Axca looked on in horror as Lotor kept his hands firmly on his knees, hunched over as he panted and fought to get his breath back.   
"The Hanahaki disease? I thought that was common only to Alteans?" She barely whispered as Lotor straightened again, wiping the smears of blood off his lips and chin.   
"I thought I'd be able to avoid it, since Galra blood runs through my veins, I was wrong." His cursed how weak and hoarse his voice sounded.   
"Who is it? Any Altean who would've know the surgery died ten thousand years ago, if we confront who's caused this for you perhaps we can fix it before-" Axca was cut off by the Prince himself.   
"No. After what I've done, they'll never love me anyways." He stated simply, though a sense of dread pitted itself in his stomach.   
"Listen to me carefully Axca, the others mustn't know about this. Not a single word. They mustn't worry about something as juvenile as this while they have important work to do." Lotor somehow gained some of his more demanding voice back as he looked down at his General, ready for her to fight back. But she had merely nodded, and walked away. 

It slowly got worse. 

Flowers were more common than petals now. Many sleepless nights were spent hacking up the flowers. 

He killed Narti. 

Lotor was distraught. He caught wind of discontent among his generals immediately after he did it. They didn't understand. She had betrayed them, given secret insight to Haggar. 

So he killed her. 

Axca still spoke to him normally, as if nothing was wrong. But he knew it wouldn't last. 

And it didn't. 

He hacked up flower after flower as they flew to the ruins of Daibazzal, leaving a good few inches of flowers on the floor of his ship's cockpit. His quintessence experiment hadn't worked. Anger coursed through his veins as he stood at the edge of a floating chunk of rock, sharp nails digging into his palm. He heard someone walk up behind him, and the sinking feeling in his stomach returned. 

"For Narti."

Lotor awoke, and immediately coughed up more flowers, pain coming from his wrists. He was tied. Of course. They would give him up for the glory, wouldn't they? He popped his shoulders out of their sockets, twisting his arms up and around his head before ripping the cuffs, and sending his last tie to the Empire out into space. He got attacked by Zarkon, something he anticipated, and took in stride. 

So many flowers filled his cock pit. 

And an idiotic idea filled his brain. 

He'd join up with Voltron, help them while he still could, perhaps make her see that he was sorry for the wrongs he had committed while he still had the chance. 

It had been the perfect opportunity, gaining their trust by shooting down the shield. Of course, most of the Paladins didn't trust him, in fact, it seemed the only one willing to give him a chance was the one named Shiro, paladin of the black lion. 

One night, Lotor had decided to take a walk around the castle to collect his thoughts and to get away from the piles of flowers on his floor, not wishing to be distraught by them for only a moment. Shiro had interrupted, and began to talk.   
"I know it's hard, that period of time after you finally get away from the Galra and you're trying to figure out what you're doing. And I know the rest of the team doesn't place much trust in you, because of what you've done previously. But I personally think you proved a lot just by leaving and coming here instead. You saved one of our soldiers." Shiro halted, and so did Lotor as they turned to look at each other.   
"Deep down, you're a good guy, I know that, it just might take awhile for the rest of the team to figure it out." Shiro had patted him on the shoulder and they had both parted ways, leaving Lotor to wander back to his room in the dark. 

The piles of flowers in his room only grew larger and larger, Lotor frequently left meetings to go and hack up the damned things. 

If only she didn't hate him. 

If only he hadn't been a fool and blindly followed in his father's footsteps. 

If only he had the guts to tell her. 

Did she even remember him?

Rapidly, his body began to weaken, making room for the flowers, feeding the flowers with whatever nourishment he had. His eyes became dry and scratchy, he could feel the beginning of more flowers blooming just under his lower eyelid, ready to come and show the universe he was dying. 

He was dying. 

He sat silently at a station, typing in coordinates and studying supply routs that he already knew by heart when it happened. 

"If you're not feeling well, you should really go rest." She had spoke absent mindedly, checking the hologram from over his shoulder. He was speechless for a moment, focusing merely on the screen before replying.   
"I'm fine to keep working. It's nothing." Lotor replied aimlessly, purposely diverting his gaze.   
"Are you sure? You've looked rather sickly the past few days." She pointed out, standing back up straight.   
"I'm fine, Allura. Don't waste your time worrying about me." He smiled softly, the named rolled of his tongue like smooth honey, he hadn't said it in so long.   
"If you insist." Was all she said before walking away, missing the single petal that floated out of his mouth as he let go of the breath he hadn't realized he was holding. 

Voltron was out there at this very moment, fighting hard for control of a planet. But it wasn't going as smoothly as planned. Lotor was at the head of the castle of lions, Coran had left to go to a Balmera a few days earlier and had yet to return.   
"We need to retreat!" Lotor gritted his teeth as Shiro spoke.   
"But we can't make a worm hole, Allura isn't in the ship, no Altean is on the ship!" Lance cried out into the comm before yelling in surprise.   
"Allura you have to get back to the ship!" Hunk cried out.   
"No! We can't break formation!" Shiro demanded.   
"We need a worm hole!" Lance cried.   
"Lotor! Lotor is part Altean!" Lotor froze as he heard Allura's voice finally come through the comm, revealing his father close kept secret to the Voltron team.   
"Lotor, you need to form a wormhole!" Allura cried again.   
"I- I don't think-" he stuttered, standing up straight in shock.   
"We need you to form a wormhole, try, please!" Allura cried out before yelling, reminiscent to Lance as she got hit. Lotor found himself slowly walking over to the platform, holding his hands out and placing them on the pedestals. 

This was it. 

As he began channeling his energy, coughs and dry heaves wrecked his body, flowers spewing out onto the floor. 

Any resilience that he had left was being sucked away from him with the power he was putting into the wormhole. 

The flowers had realized he was now weak, and seized their opportunity. 

The pain was unimaginable, bloody flowers pooling around him, petals floating through the air, his arms and legs mere moments away from giving out. 

Lotor collapsed into his sea of flowers with a thud, ending the wormhole. 

His heart beat pounded in his ears, and he could hardly hear anything over it, only faintly the voices of the team calling out for him to confirm his safety. 

Lotor was dizzy, weak, breathing heavily. 

Lotor was dying. 

The last thing he saw before it all faded away was the final flower he coughed up, a beautiful, large flower, with a shade of pink that only reminded him of one thing. 

It was the same shade of pink that Allura herself wore. 

The flower floated up with his heaving breath for a few centimeters, and then fell and settled on his lips as it all faded away. 

Lotor was dead.


End file.
